A common problem that arises with mobile electronic devices is locating a misplaced device. Cell phones, for example, are notorious for getting lost.
Conventionally there are two types of methods for locating a misplaced phone. One method, used primarily with cordless phones, involves paging the cordless phone from the phone's base station. When paged, the cordless phone generates an audible alert which enables a user to find the phone. This method generally does not apply to cell phones, since although cell phones are paged by operators via base stations, they do not have personal base station paging capability.
Another method for locating a misplaced phone is to call the phone from another phone. The misplaced phone can be tracked by its ringing sound. This method is commonly used for locating cell phones. However, this method does not work if the misplaced phone has been set to an inaudible ring mode, such as a silent or vibrating ring, or to a very low volume ring.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2007/0072620 A1 of Levitan, entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR RECOVERING A LOST OR STOLEN WIRELESS DEVICE, describes use of a location server for storing user-associated location information. U.S. Patent Application No. 2007/0077924 A1 of Bhogal et al., entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD TO LOCATE MOBILE DEVICES HAVING INAUDIBLE SETTINGS, describes remotely adjusting the ring tone volume of a mobile phone, so that the ring tone is audible enough for a user to hear it. According to Bhogal et al., a user calls his misplaced phone from another phone. Upon connection to his misplaced phone, the user has command options to remotely change the misplaced phone's ring tone volume.